S U R E F I R E
by hellopurpletiger
Summary: I was born in a hospital in the Powys county of Wales. Remus was born after that, very much a surprise baby. / OC-Lupin Twin, Fem-OC
1. Until Gravity Bends

_**Chapter 1: Until Gravity Bends**_

* * *

The world, as we know it, only exists as so because of the decisions made before us. The path forks endlessly - a spider web of decisions and indecisions, action and inaction in equal parts. The beat of the butterfly's wing perturbs the air currents and across the continent, a tornado begins to twist even once the creature has long since ceased to exist. A lone pebble drops off the shoreline and leaves ripples spilling across the clear water in its wake.

 _"For want of a nail, the shoe was lost;_

 _For want of a shoe, the horse was lost;_

 _For want of a horse, the rider was lost;_

 _For want of a rider, the message was lost;_

 _For want of a message, the battle was lost;_

 _For want of a battle, the kingdom was lost;_

 _And all for the want of a horseshoe nail."_

Mum used to tell us this proverb whenever we tried to rush into things, reminding us not to forget our coats 'for want of a nail'. Being prepared for all eventualities was something of Mum's hobby, and she never ceased to remind us of it. She would recite the poem so much that by the time I could form sentences, I could also spout it back to her.

Later, it would come to mean less of 'prepared-ness' and more that every action had its consequence, no matter how small.

Perhaps, in one When, Hope never took a walk in the forest to clear her head. Perhaps the muggle woman never stumbled across a boggart. Perhaps my father never got permission for his expedition into the valleys of Wales, and so never heard her scream. Perhaps, the weather was simply so awful neither of them ever set foot outdoors.

But on the day they met, Hope Howell had stepped out on a smoke break and gone for a gander in the forests nearby to vent her frustration at being one of the only girls at the office and Lyall Lupin was on an expedition in the valleys, studying the formation of Boggarts for his thesis. And Hope had stumbled upon a black shape in the trees. Lyall heard her scream and came barging through, wand raised at the ready and promptly turned the shifting black mass into a field mushroom.

Their wedding photos often featured a tiered cake, topped by a lurid red and white mushroom, which guests had my mum to thank for.

The rest, as they say, was history.

I was born in a hospital in Merthyr Tydfil, the closest town to mum's native village of Crai in the Powys county of Wales. _Naina_ would later explain that even though our village had a midwife, she did not trust that hoity-toity woman one bit, not with her coin purse, not with her dog and certainly not with the birth of her grandchildren. _Taid_ and Dad had been fussing in the front of the car, trying to keep one eye on the road and the other on my very pregnant mum, whilst _naina_ and Mum got talking about names. I heard the story a lot growing up, and every Christmas it would all spill out again, with good natured ribbing at the men's expense, of course.

I was born first, bald and squalling and red-faced. Ugly as anything, _taid_ would say with a fond grin and a ruffle of my hair. Here, my dad would pointedly disagree, before being shot down over being unable to see through his sobbing at the time. And when the hospital staff were just beginning to clean mum up, the next contraction started.

Remus was born after, very much a surprise baby.

We spent most of our first few years in Wales, in the magicless village my mother grew up in, surrounded by the rolling hills and the deep lakes. Living with _naina_ and _taid_ , our grandparents, was nice. They ran the local pub with the help of our Uncle Huw, mum's older brother and we spent many an afternoon napping in one of the window booths, warming in the sun.

Dad was often busy, trying to secure employment at the Ministry now that he'd received his Mastery and in between being hassled by his bosses and pouring cups of tea and coffee, we were lucky if we caught glimpses of him before bed. Mum was the one to coo over our first words and feed us mashed vegetables, kissing our foreheads and chubby cheeks.

Dad loved us though, even at that age I could tell. On his rare days off, he would spoil us rotten, chasing us through the garden whilst we giggled and tried to hide. When our laughter finally quietened, he would sit us on his lap, a twin on each knee and tell us about the other world we were part of - one we had to keep secret from the rest of Mum's family. His eyes would brighten and his face would look warmer, and less haggard, and it would seem like the very magic he spoke of spilled from his lips.

The Howells, Mum's family, disapproved of Dad I think. There were pointed stares and even more pointed remarks. _Naina_ would sigh loudly, brows furrowed, about lousy men who couldn't even afford a house to keep his bairns in, whilst _taid_ patted our cheeks and told us not to worry about it, a stony look in his eyes.

Remy and I didn't think much of it. We were far too busy investigating the tadpoles in the lake and looking for shiny stones on the shore. Or looking for worms to show Mum, which always made Uncle Huw laugh raucously over her reddening cheeks, pink squiggly things that wriggled in our palms, squishy and wet.

Our favourite game was our magic game.

Most mornings, after breakfast, we'd march out into the back garden, stomping in our wellie-boots over the marshy land, squelching mud underfoot as I dragged Remy behind me, hand in hand. By rights, I was always the Princess-mage and Remy, my knight-wizard, and together we fought against the fluffy-tuft-tails and yellow-lionfaces that sprouted across the garden, vanquishing them through our mysterious magic powers.

It had been a day like any other. We'd been crawling through the undergrowth, mud slick on our clothes and in our boots. Remy had hidden behind me when the dragon lionface had emerged, a bright yellow burst of flowers hidden behind _naina's_ rosebushes, against the rickety fence.

I brandished my stick in front of me, eyes narrowed.

"M'gonna protect Remy!" I yelled, dashing forwards.

It happened almost in slow motion. The ground was already wet from rain and my boots were slippery against the mud and roots on the ground. Remy's hand was still fisted in my coat, his other holding his own slightly smaller stick bravely.

My footing slipped-

 _-the ground was flying towards me -_

 _something **wrenched** me backwards -_

 _my arms pinwheeling for balance and -_

\- we fell.

There was a moment of brief silence as we both blinked in shock. And then the pain registered. In saving me from my faceplant into the mud and the dragon lionfaces (bright dandelions), Remy had yanked me hard enough to send us both reeling backwards into _naina's_ rosebush.

Remy broke the silence with a piercing wail, flailing to fall back on safe ground. His face crumpled into tears, red scratches and embedded thorns in his hands and face.

"'urts! 'urts!" He sobbed.

I crawled after him until we were both back in the mud, hands hovering unsurely. "S'okay, Remy!"

My brother only cried louder.

My throat tightened, the backs of my eyes stinging. We were just playing, I hadn't meant to get Remy hurt! I was supposed to be the one fighting the lionface, not my brother! I crouched down by his side, hands reaching for the first thorn I could see. It wasn't in embedded very deep, and only the size of my nail. With a few flicks of clumsy toddler hands, it was out.

There weren't any more thorns on him, and apart from a few scratches he looked okay. But he was still crying, little gasps in-between choked off wails.

My stomach twisted horribly at the sound. I had made it better, hadn't I? By pulling those sharp things out? It shouldn't hurt anymore! My mouth tasted sharp and sour, like unripened apples too tart to taste pleasant. Remy's sandy hair was matted with mud and leaves, his arms crossed in front of him like he was afraid the bush was still going to attack him. His face was all scrunched together despite the red scratches that crisscrossed his nose and cheeks, beads of blood pooling on the surface. _My brother_.

Something below my skin, roiling and bubbling, surged.

 _Naina_ found us only a few short moments after, tucked behind her prize-winning roses and covered in mud with the torn remnants of our coats scattered around us. There was a sizable dent in the bush now, from where two bodies had collided into it, our hands littered with threadlike scratches of red.

But all that was left of Remy's tears were the dry tracks on his face, a line of lighter skin against the mucky soil and on his lips there was a smile instead, the skin on his face dirty but unmarred.

She shrieked a little at the mess we'd made of ourselves and ushered us in for a bath, fussing over the mud and the state of our clothing.

It was my first taste of Magic. The first irrevocable proof I had that Daddy's stories were right, and we were _magic_ too.

I tried to quiz him about it when he got home. It had felt eager and warm, like turning your face towards a sunbeam until you had the warmth in it down to your bones. I didn't know the words to explain it to him, but in between my excited squeaks of "Magic! Magic, Daddy!" and clingy Remy hugs, I think he got the message.

"Accidental magic," He'd chortled, kissing me fondly, "My little witch!"

"P'incess-mage!" I strongly disagreed.

"Ah," He hugged us both close, "A protective Princess-mage and her steady knight-wizard, is that right?"

A few months after that, Dad's luck changed. The papers he'd been writing had finally been accepted by the international journals and seemingly overnight, Lyall Lupin had become inundated with offers of work and employment. Some of them were from the Ministry, others from as far afield as Japan and the Continent.

I wonder what would have happened, if Dad had gone for a job in Tokyo, or for the ICW, instead of opting for the Department for Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures for the British Ministry of Magic? So many things would have changed, we might have been raised knowing different languages, I would befriend different people, everything from the magic we practised to the food we ate could have changed. Another of those action and inaction ripples.

Instead, we stayed in Britain - still in Wales, but out of Powys county and into a little cottage on the edge of one of the bigger cities instead, far closer to London than we had been previously. _Naina_ and _taid_ had been disappointed, but opted to visit often, with Uncle Huw driving out at least once every other week.

Our new house had, what some people might call, character. It was very modest and very traditional, with thick thatched roofs and lattice across the windows, trails of ivy growing around the front door. The walls were painted a sunny yellow and the windows gleamed in the morning's light. There was a little paved path that twisted through the wild grass and flowers all the way from gated-entryway to the front door.

"What do you think?" Dad had Remy in the crook of his arm, but he was looking towards Mum, shifting his weight from foot to foot. "It's a little messy right now, but-"

I fixed my arms around Mum's neck, as she smoothed down my hair, fingers trembling. Her voice was thick when she finally spoke. "Lyall, I love it!"

We still shared a room, but it was bigger now, with enough room for a set of beds on either side, bracketing a window and a heavy chest of drawers. There was a toy chest against one wall and, when we opened it, Remy and I found all our toys safely packed within.

The move into the new house brought other things with it too.

Whereas before, we mainly played by ourselves in the garden in the pub whilst everyone else was working, now we took trips outside and played with other kids in the park. Mum spent less time looking harried at maintaining the peace between Dad and her family and cleaning tables, and more time sitting in the garden with a thick pad of paper and a pen in her hand, her smile warm and her laughter infectious.

Dad, too, looked more relaxed. I'd never realised how tense he was until we moved out of Crai village. He had always been a quiet man, but in our new home he became less so, more inclined to speak freely and make noise without too much of a care.

Now that we were four, Mum had decided we should begin to learn how to read and write. She would sit us down for about an hour each day, and teach us to trace our names onto thick parchment with waxy crayons. Remy loved it, his eyes lighting up and a happy flush painting his cheeks every time our parents complemented his handwriting or when he sounded out a word correctly. He would sit there happily engrossed in the way the wax would trail across his page or drag another book out from the shelf for Mum or Dad to read.

On the other hand, I had to be bribed with sweet treats and threatened with no dessert to comply to sitting still for something as boring as handwriting!

The summer sun would be shining and I'd see a glimpse of something glittering in the tall grass in the fields surrounding the cottage and I'd be off, racing out the door with a cheeky "See ya!" I was always caught before I made it passed the gate but it never stopped me from trying - there were puddles to stomp in, the fields to explore and new things to collect.

Both Remy and I liked collecting things.

My twin brother preferred books and stories and pictures, records of events written down. He had a little stack under his bed for stories Mum would write us - not Dad's Magic stories - but they were some of his favourites nonetheless.

I preferred shiny things, interesting things. Parchment, I had no use for, unless it had cool pictures. I piled all my trinkets into an old shoebox, filled with interesting bits and bobs from our adventures outside. There was a brassy penny, perfectly shiny in the way that new coins always were, that I had found in the park one afternoon. A glossy green river stone I'd found in the brook out on a walk with Dad and Remy. A speckled feather full of browns and whites and blacks that was the softest thing I'd ever felt. And a dented silvery ring, it's metal dull and no longer gleaming, that I'd found in a ditch by the roadside.

It wasn't that I was particularly dumb, or at least I hope not, but Remy and I, for all our twin-like tendencies were different. I loved getting muddy and the cold rain on my face, even if I had to face Mum's tutting and fussing afterwards or get put in bed with a cold. Remy loved reading and he loved his stories. Oh, he could always be convinced to play and he would enjoy it, but given the choice he would often opt for the books inside than a jaunt around the park.

There wasn't really a village park to play in, so to speak. There wasn't a village at all. Our new house was one of a few that dotted a winding road that led from the motorway. The cottage was actually sandwiched between two farms, as if it were some sort of groundskeeper's lodging. We owned none of the surrounding lands, but the owners to either side of us all had kids and were more than understanding of our trespassing, as long as we stayed off the crops. The largest farm, which everyone had since affectionately termed the 'Park', was some thirty minutes away on foot, meaning we had to be carried there or risk falling asleep before we arrived. It had been nicknamed as such because it belonged to a childless couple whose children had long since moved out and left their old games and toys out for the rest of us to play with, in a grassy plot by the hay bales.

There was a tall, tall oak tree with a proper treehouse resting in its heavy boughs and rungs nailed into the trunk to create a sturdy ladder. There was a strong tyre swing which if you took a running start at it, loped you over a deep ditch so it felt like you were flying as the ground dropped beneath you. And an old rusty tractor, that no longer had its wheels or most of its gears, but the steering wheel worked perfectly fine and doubled as a good climbing frame when scaling the trees got too monotonous.

It was still a muggle settlement, so every time we got close to the Park, whichever parent was chaperoning us would make us recite our rules. Rule Number One was no leaving the park without telling an adult. Rule Number Two was look out for your twin - but really, that one could have gone without saying. Rule Three, was the most important, no magic in front of the muggles.

Despite having to be careful, we made friends fairly easily. We were the new kids, and some of the youngest, but as long as we didn't try to upset the hierarchy the other children didn't mind overmuch. Most of the other kids were older than us, and tolerated us with rolls of their eyes and patronising smiles, nudging their younger siblings forward.

There was only one actual kid our age, a freckle-faced boy with chubby cheeks and a strong lisp who introduced himself boldly as "Rhys".

Remy shuffled slightly behind me, hand gripping the edge of my sleeve warily. I strode forwards, tugging him with me. "I'm Ro, and this is my twin Remy!" I stuck my hand out, we were new and though the other kids weren't hostile, we lost our novelty after a while. It had been my idea to ask Mum to take us out, so it was only fair that I was the one who did the talking-part too.

He mouthed the words to himself, cheeks wobbling. "Hey! That rhymes!"

"No, it doesn't." Remy muttered behind me.

I tried valiantly not to grin. "It's like a tongue twister, though - Ro, Rhys, Remy…Remy, Ro, Rhys." I snickered. "Try saying that five times fast!"

And that was how we made our first friend.

Rhys turned out to be older than us by quite a few months and was forever obsessed with things that rhymed even if they did not. He was always piping into conversations with "Hey! That rhymes!" whenever he could, even with Remy bickering back that it most certainly did not.

The older kids liked to commandeer the tree house, slyly standing at the top of the ladder so we couldn't get in. And the rope swing and the tractor were a little too big for us to clamber in without help so mostly we chased each other around and rolled on the grass, flinging bits of grass clippings and scattered hay at each other.

Remy joined in sometimes, flinging hay and giggling madly, but most of the time he was content to follow behind us, clutching his newest book and playing the long-suffering dragon who was sick and tired of guarding the squabbling king and princess-mage. I would have worried more about his lack of interest in Rhys' and my roughhousing if it wasn't for Carys, a bookworm of a girl a few years older than us who had promptly decided that her new favourite thing was to read to my four year old brother and coo over him.

When we weren't spending our days at the park, or under Mum's eye, clutching our crayons in preparation for joining the nearest Primary school; we were dragging Mum out to make daisy chains in the garden or draw on the public path in coloured chalk and giggling at our designs.

Dad came home in the evenings in time to help keep us occupied whilst Mum made dinner. Every evening, Mum would glance at her watch with a secretive smile and say "It's nearly five o'clock!" and without fail, Remy and I would drop everything and be dashing for the front of the fireplace before she'd finished speaking. We would sit on the couch, facing the fire, eyes fixed on the flickering flames and bouncing in excitement.

And every night, the fire would flash into a luminous green flare and the shape of a tall, lanky man would tumble through, trip on the hem of the carpet and land sprawled on the floor beneath the couch.

And every time he returned home, we'd grin from our perches. "Welcome home, Daddy!" in synchrony.

It became routine to watch him flick his wand and the soot disappear in order for us to tug him onto the couch for stories and what magical things he'd encountered at work that day. Mum would laugh at our reactions, laughter tinkling over the sounds of pots and pans clanging in the kitchen.

It became so routine, that deviating from it remained the one of the most memorable moments of my childhood.

It was a Sunday in October. By the time we'd woken up that morning, Dad had already left for work. Mum had shooed us out of bed and disappeared back down the stairs. Remy and I proceeded to stumble over each other and each other's toys on the way to the bathroom, sharing a sink when we brushed our teeth and when we finally wound our way down to the kitchen, Mum already had toast and the strawberry jam, that Rhys' Mum had brought over last week, ready and waiting on the table. The countryside out the window was dark and grey, a thin drizzle visible even from where I was sitting.

"Can we go outside?" I asked hopefully, maybe Mum hadn't seen the rain yet. Across the table, Remy shot a glance to the window and then back to my face, nose wrinkling.

Mum ruffled my hair, and I pouted. "A thousand years too young to trick your mother, Ro."

"A thousand?" I stared plaintively at my jammy toast. "The rain'll all be gone, then!"

"S'cold." Remy pointed out, around a mouthful of his own breakfast, jam smeared on his cheek.

"But puddles!"

It was an point we agreed to disagree on often.

Mum laughed at us both, pressing kisses to our cheeks and swiping the jam of Remy's face with a napkin. He made a face at her as she did so. "Maybe later," She conceded, "How about we get some writing done and then we can bake some cookies for Daddy to have when he comes back? And we'll think about the puddles again after that?"

We spent the rest of the day indoors, the rain never abating, a solid film of grey falling from the sky. The house was warm though, from the heat of the oven and the ever present glow of the fire. It smelt of cookies and gooey chocolates that made my mouth water and my stomach grumble. Eventually, after a lunch of thick broth and buttery rolls, Mum let us out in our raincoats and wellies to stomp in the puddles for a few moments. I wheedled Remy from his nook in the window until he conceded with a slight grin and a puffed "Oh, fine." trying to hide that he didn't mind as much as he said he did.

We stomped out in matching boots, the autumn rain light enough that it didn't hamper our fun but still constant and cool, meaning we were ushered in sooner than I'd liked, soaked and clutching our bellies with laughter. Mum rushed us into the bath, already running and bobbing with the little wooden boats taid had made us for Christmas.

"Mum," I asked as she helped me towel dry my hair, my voice muffled by the heavy cloth. "Is Rhys coming to play tomorrow?"

He was five now, older than us and despite playing with us regularly enough to be our friend, loved to point out that he was _older_ now and so what he said, obviously was true. Which caused Remy to point out Rhys' rhyming failures even more pointedly.

Remy groaned, already shrugging into his jumper, sleeves trailing. "He's gonna try and rhyme everything!"

I snickered. "Yeah, but you're smart! So you always know when he's wrong!"

"Doesn't mean it's not annoying." My brother mumbled, yawning into his hands.

"Well, yeah, but he's our friend!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know."

We spent the rest of the afternoon begging Mum for the cookies, even though we'd promised to wait until Dad got home, and Remy going back to his nook to read whilst I skittered around the house, exploring and looking for more shiny things to put in my box. Sometime in-between then and the countryside getting darker, I fell asleep on the stairs, face pressed into the steps.

Mum woke me gently, chuckling quietly. "C'mon, Ro, it's time for dinner."

Sleepily, I slumped my way down the stairs after her, holding her hand. Remy was already at the table, eyes twitching towards his closed book left on the arm of the couch regretfully.

"Whe…Where's Daddy?" I mumbled, rubbing my eyes.

"I think he's going to be at work a little while longer yet," She put a steaming plate of cottage pie in front of me, roast vegetables piled up next to it. Cauliflower - I pushed it to the very edge of my plate in distaste.

"Is he gonna be back soon?" Remy asked suddenly.

"Going to." Mum corrected. "And I'm sure he'll be back as soon as he can."

There was really no way Mum would know for sure though. After all, our only means of communication was the house telephone, a plastic mint-green contraption with a funny little dial that you had to turn to get it to work and kept on a little table in the spare room. A muggle telephone, which of course, Dad couldn't use at work or even find at work - not a functional one anyways. There were communications spells, of course, but they surprised Mum every time, who never expected to hear a voice where nobody was, funnily enough. And we didn't own an Owl.

I'm sure Mum must have worried whenever Dad stayed out late, her husband off in a world she could not contact or even approach, no way of knowing what had happened to him if he was ever hurt. This never occurred to me when I was younger, and I doubted they occurred to Remy at the time either. Beyond a fission of unease, I went back to eating my dinner and avoiding the cauliflower on my plate with a grudge and soon forgot about asking where Dad was, in favour of Mum's cooking.

It was several hours later, in fact, before we heard the sound of the Floo activating and Dad came home. Remy was already heading up to bed and I was chugging the last of my milk, the remnants of my cookie scattered across the table.

"Lyall!" Mum gasped as Dad tumbled bodily through the flames. He righted himself, toeing off his boots sharply, a dark expression on his face, muttering jaggedly. I barely caught a glance of his scowling face before Mum was ushering me up the stairs. "You and Remy get ready for bed, I'll be up to tuck you both in later."

Usually, I'd argue that I wasn't tired yet, or that we needed at least three stories before bedtime, but something in Mum's face, tight and her eyes slipping back towards where Lyall Lupin was pacing, made me nod uncertainly and trek up the stairs instead.

Remy was waiting on the landing, peering over the banister. "Was that Dad?"

I nodded, reaching for his hand. "Mum says we should brush our teeth."

His eyes lingered on the patch of hallway we could see from the top of the stairs, and then he nodded and let me lead him towards the bathroom. We were both quiet as we stood over the sink, ears straining to hear what was going on. Over the sound of our brushes, Dad's voice was loud enough to be heard, frustrated and tense, Mum's voice a soothing murmur heard only barely beneath his sharp tenor.

We washed our faces and headed for our room.

"Dad didn't get to try our cookies." I said, as we separated to crawl into our beds.

Remy's face was drawn contemplatively, "Is he upset?" he asked suddenly.

I considered it briefly, before dismissing it. "I don't think so? We weren't naughty at all today."

"Except from when you splashed me."

I pointed right back at him, "You splashed me back!"

"Only 'cause you did it first."

"That wasn't naughty." I frowned. "I was playing."

"Mum did say not to."

I stuck my tongue out.

Across the room, he giggled back, snuggling further under his own sheets.

Mum and Dad both came up a few moments later, holding hands. Their eyes were red-rimmed and they were holding each other tightly. Dad was still dressed in his work robes, his black and navy uniform marking him a member of the DMLE, with the purple and white crest of his Department sewn over the breast pocket. His usually neat hair was wild and unkempt and his rolled sleeves exposed a few bruises and scratches, like he'd gotten into a tussle.

"Daddy?" Remy's voice hitched worriedly.

He let out an explosive sigh before coming to sit on the side of my brother's bed, carding a gentle hand through the mousey-brown coloured hair all three of us had. "Sorry, I'm late," He said, voice thick in his throat. Remy and I exchanged nervous glances, we'd never seen Dad this upset before. "I had a bit of a bad day at work."

I reached out a hand for him, his large palm engulfing mine warmly.

He squeezed it gently and then bent to softly kiss our brows. "Daddy loves you both, lots and lots and lots." He rose as Mum bent down to repeat the motion.

"Love you, darlings. Sleep well."

They didn't read us a story that night, merely tucked us in and then Dad cast his twinkle-light spell and Mum flicked the lights off with little fanfare. With all that had gone on that day, writing and reading, and baking and stomping, and exploring and splashing, and our stomachs full from dinner and cookies, and warm in our beds, we still drifted off - exhausted from our day.

Maybe it was because we didn't get our story that I woke again, later that night. The rain was lashing against the windows, and a strong gale howled sharply beyond our house and through the farms surrounding it. The soft lights Dad had casted still illuminated the room, bobbing softly like boats on calm lake, pale lights drifting high above us against the ceiling.

Remy was still fast asleep. His face was soft and slack, cheek pressed into his pillow and one arm wrapped snuggly around his blanket, clutching the knitted lines close to his chest.

I rolled over to face the wall, shutting my eyes. Had I been dreaming before I woke? I searched lazily for the tail of the thought, if it had indeed existed, before giving up entirely. The bed creaked beneath me as I twisted, my duvet wrapped around my ankles, tasting hair in my mouth. I scowled and pushed my hair away from my face, uncaring of the tangles my hands caused.

I pushed my blanket off my legs, letting my bare ankles dangle in the cold air, one splayed off the edge of the bed. The duvet was too warm, and I was sweating in my pyjamas. The air was icy on my toes, a hint of the winter to come, goosepimples rising across my shins. Curling my feet, I stuck them back under the covers, with a huff.

I froze as Remy let out a soft sigh, his eyelashes fluttering.

I waited for a moment, holding my breath. He shifted, wriggling further into his bedsheets and then his breathing deepened once more. Tentatively, I sat up in bed, wrapping my knitted blanket around me like a cape, mindful of waking Remy. The storm outside was so loud - would there be thunder soon?

The floorboards were cold and worn smooth beneath my bare feet as I stood. There was some cream downstairs, and plenty of cookies left still. But downstairs would be dark and cold…no twinkle-lights to help me navigate the stairs. And, if it was raining this much…my eyes fell towards the windows…who knew if we still had power? There was nothing worse than thinking you had light, only for the switch to click uselessly.

And Mum would definitely notice any cookies missing tomorrow morning - she was keener than any hawk and would undoubtedly concoct some sort of horrible punishment as a consequence - like spending an extra hour on writing properly or something equally as -

I paused. Outside the wind was still whipping viciously through the trees, the rain hammering at our roof and against the glass, smearing the view of the night beyond, but for a moment I thought I'd heard something. I stepped forwards, heel-toe, heel-toe, across to the window. It was probably nothing, I breathed shakily.

My reflection dimmed the closer I got, replaced by the black tendrils of branches whipping on the moors and an inky darkness that looked like it had swallowed the world whole. It must have been something in the wind.

There was a scratching sound, close by, low down.

I flicked my gaze down before I could stop.

 _Yellow eyes._

Then it was right in front of me, shattering the glass in one leap so fast, I hadn't even seen it move. There was a flash of _something_ right before me. Force slammed into my torso. And then it was the wall that I felt slamming into my back.

Pain exploded across my vision. Smatterings of white stars that bled.

I looked down, blinked, confused. My legs felt funny, all numb and tingly. They didn't work. My pyjama bottoms were red now.

There was a hulking shape in the centre of our bedroom. Coarse hair sprouting down its back in grotesque tufts. But it wasn't facing me.

I blinked again, slower and heavier.

The muscles in its back rippled, and a meaty arm reached down into the other bed, claws slick with blood.

 _Small and helpless and daddymummysomebodysave_

The shape lent down, stooping low. But it wasn't facing me. I tried to sit up properly. One hand fluttered uselessly against the ground, the other reached where the skin of my stomach should have been.

Clumsy fingers touched it. It was warm, warm and wet and slick, where my shirt should have been. Something felt loose in there. My hand shouldn't have been in there.

I tried to lift my head.

It wasn't facing me.

The white spots were bleeding black now, sparking and gushing across the room. The _monster_ had my brother by the shoulders, stooped over his bed.

Remy's mouth was stretched agape, it probably hurt his jaw. His eyes were too wide in his skull.

For a brief moment, our eyes met.

 _Remy-remynonononNONONO_

The monster lunged.

 _ **Rem-**_

* * *

 **A/N: hello! Yes I have sinned and commited that horrible practice of writing an OC fic! I resisted for so long! It's written in the style of an SI-OC but I've get to decided if Ro is or not! Title and chapter title from Surefire by John Legend. Stay tuned for more to come!**


	2. Salt Vein

_**Chapter 2: Salt Vein**_

* * *

I came to in ebbs and flows, slowly. Being unconscious is not the same as falling asleep, and returning from it wasn't quite the same as waking either - not quite as natural. There was no sense of myself, no passage of time, no light and no darkness, there simply was.

Gradually, I slipped back from it, tugging away from it like a leaf on the water's surface, slightly adrift. There was a gentle hum, not close enough to be distinct, but it was there, just buzzing on the edge of my senses. There was something beneath me - soft and cushioned, depressed slightly around me. My body, now that I was aware of it, felt too light and too heavy all at once, though I didn't try to move. Didn't want to.

Something bright and cheerful sounded from somewhere far off, fluttering on high. _Birdsong_.

Was it a blackbird, or a sparrow?

I pried my eyelids open, blinking away the stickiness of my lashes blearily and pushed myself up shakily on my forearms.

In the dim light, I could see the end of a bed - not mine - it's mattress wider and far larger than my own, two raised log-like shapes under white sheets. I wriggled my toes. The coverlet shifted.

It took a while for the movement to sink in, the moment to sink in. It took even longer for the thoughts:

I was alive. I was still here. It… _It_ hadn't gotten me.

There was a figure on a chair, not too far from the bed. Dad was fast asleep, his face pale and tense, eyes flickering beneath his eyelids. He was dressed in a rumpled sweater, the knit stretched and fraying, and dark trousers.

We were in my parents' room. This bed and the room were so much bigger than the room I shared with Remy.

 _Remy_.

I tried to shout. There was a horrible noise from my throat instead, like the creaking of a rusty hinge. Dad jerked. One arm flailed wildly to catch himself on the edge of the metal bedframe.

I…I had gone to check the window…looked outside…and _something had stared back._ And then Remy…face too gaunt, skin stretched thin, eyes nearly black with terror.

And then -

Was it a dream - a _nightmare_? Had I made the whole thing up?

"Ro," Dad breathed, scarcely above a whisper of a breath, "You're awake."

I stared. There was something drawn and haunted in Dad's eyes, in the way his gaze lingered for a long moment on my face like he thought I was a figment of his imagination, inhaling shallowly like any sudden movement would - hurt me? Scare me? I couldn't tell. There was a cooling cup of tea by his foot on the floor; by the other, my favourite book - "The Fortunes and Feats of Ffion the Furious" pages down and spine cracked. Guiltily, I wondered how long Dad had been sitting there, waiting and worried.

He moved in one smooth bend, and hugged me tightly. I could feel the warm tears dripping onto my shoulder, the smell of turpentine and dittany clung to him thickly. Dad was here now. A solid warmth clutching me as close as I did him. _Dad was here_.

I felt something in me let go, where I hadn't even known I'd been wrung tight. I wanted to cry, to tell him how scared I was till I no longer had the words, to tell him I hadn't opened the window, hadn't tried to, but the monster had come in anyways.

"…'emy," I croaked out instead.

"He's fine, he's fine," He hushed, choked. "Oh sweetheart, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry." He broke off into murmurs I couldn't make out.

I didn't know why he was apologising. It didn't matter that he hadn't seen it, hadn't seen the black shape coming for us. It didn't matter. What mattered was that he was here now, holding me tightly.

He was here. And my dad could chase them off, the boggarts and the wraiths and _the monster_ , like he did in his stories.

Mum cried when she came in later. Great heaving sobs that she tried valiantly to hide behind her hands and then, when that seemed to fail, into Dad's chest. He rubbed circles into her back, whispering fervently to her, as her shoulders rose and fell erratically. When she had calmed enough to release him, she immediately went for me, scooping me into her arms as her breathing hitched.

My parents looked haggard and exhausted. Mum had been only nineteen when she had us, and Dad twenty three. They were young but they seemed to have aged since I saw them last, a little thinner than I remembered, a little more stooped. Mum's usually finely braided hair was held in a lumpy bun, her hair uneven in the up-do, tendrils of wispy blonde hair smattered across her forehead. Dad's freckles were nearly non-existent, his mouth pursed tight in an expression I could not read.

It was only once I was ensconced on the bed with Mum, her arm over my shoulder and my head resting on her chest that Dad spoke again.

"Do you…" His voice was soft. "Do you remember what happened?"

Mum's heartbeat thudded against my ear.

I swallowed, looking up at her. Her usually smiling face was serious, drawn smooth and stiff. There was something in my throat, weighted and sickly. I wanted nothing more than to bury my head into Mum's shoulders and clasp my hands over my ears. But this was important, this was serious. So, I told them. Told them how I had woken up in the night and couldn't get back to sleep. How I'd wanted cookies but thought Mum would notice if I took any without asking. Of how I thought I'd heard a noise outside in the storm and crept to the window to check. And then, _yellow eyes_ meeting mine in the darkness.

"After that…" I trailed off. My voice felt raw and dry, loud in the too-still room. "It was inside."

Dad cleared his throat, when he realised I had nothing left to add. "We heard Remy's scream."

 _Oh._ I hadn't heard it. I didn't even remember hearing the window smash. Remy's face contorting into a grotesque shape. _He'd been screaming._

I pushed the thought away, burnt and buried it, with a flinch. "Is he okay?"

There was a loaded silence. The weight of my words trailing off into the air, like smoke.

"He's okay, but…" They exchanged looks above my head for a brief moment, before Mum broke it to kiss the top of my head. Dad leant forwards, face softening. "He's a little different now," He paused, eyes searching mine for what I didn't know. "It wasn't a monster, sweetheart… it was a werewolf."

Up until that point, I had never heard of one before. Oh, Dad's stories often featured magical beasts and creatures, but they were usually about unicorns or fairies, beautiful and fair or funny creatures, like boggarts (which were Mum's favourites) and the things they turned into when blasted by a _Riddikulus!_ The shape that had appeared in my bedroom, yellow eyes dark and roving, something like that had never appeared in any of my childhood stories.

"W-what's that?" I shuddered a little at the memory.

"They're," Dad shuffled in place before sitting heavily in the abandoned chair. "Dark creatures. They're - they can be very dangerous."

Yes. Dangerous - I thought back to the way I hadn't even seen it - _the werewolf_ \- lift its arm before I was crashing into the wall - I could attest to that.

"They have a… disease lycanthropy." He closed his eyes briefly, "They look normal, like us, when it's not a full-moon, but the moment the moon rises, they lose that - they become Beasts." He said the last words reluctantly, slowly, and carefully measured. "They can't control that, mostly."

I didn't get it - this had nothing to do with my brother. The monster was gone, right? Nobody was telling me anything. I'd woken _ages_ ago and I still hadn't seen him. Some of my frustration must have shown on my face because Dad flinched when he looked up, and then slunk lower in his seat.

"A single bite in their Beast form, turns people into their kind, into _werewolves."_ As his voice began to fill the room once more, a chill crawled up my spine. Because I'd seen it, the hulking dark mass of the werewolf towering over my twin's bed, lunging as I did nothing. "Ro, your brother was bitten."

It couldn't be true.

Remy, _my twin brother_ , was nothing like that. He was the sweetest, kindest person I knew. He was the smartest too. And his laughter at my antics was warm and full of sunshine. He never let anyone insult me even though confrontations made him nervous and never bullied me, like Rhys said his older brothers bullied him. He just couldn't - he couldn't be _that._ There wasn't a mean bone in his body. He couldn't be like that monster that had found our bedroom, he couldn't.

"Liar." The words were out of my mouth faster than I could think them. Dad reeled back. "You're lying! Where's Remy?! I want Remy!" Something sick churned in my stomach, crawling up my throat until I was choking to breathe.

Remy wasn't like that. _(yelloweyesmetmineinthedarkand-)_ He wasn't.

Mum's arms wound round me tight, until Dad disappeared from sight. Her t-shirt was damp beneath my cheeks. "Oh, Ro, Remy's still your brother, he still loves you…" She spoke like her words were stuck in her throat, viscous like syrup. "We'll just have to be a little more careful now."

I didn't want things to change. I wanted it to be just me and Remy and Mum and Dad, in our cottage, with Uncle Huw and _taid_ and _naina_ only a phone call away. But things had changed. I couldn't leave my parents' bed, couldn't even stay awake for long, much less stand up.

My brother was a werewolf.

I hadn't come out of the attack unscathed either.

There was a thick scar, ropy and raised like a blister, across my torso. It was long and ugly and vicious, running from the top of my left ribs diagonally to taper off into a jagged point at my right hip. There were potions and balms to heal such things usually, tinctures and oils to make it better, until I would have looked like I'd never been hurt at all. However, for wounds caused by a werewolf? The only thing to stop the bleeding was powdered silver and dittany. Nothing else would suffice.

We had no access to a hospital or a proper Healer, back then we couldn't. Healers would ask questions - pointed ones - about why a four year old had injuries from a werewolf, and more importantly what had happened to the werewolf and those would all lead to Aurors and investigations and registering my twin on the Werewolf Registry, a brand for the world to see and spit on. Maybe I wouldn't have scarred quite as badly if I'd gone to St Mungo's, but I didn't die from my injuries even with Dad's inexperienced Healing - the same could not be said for Remy if someone found out.

The night after I'd first awoken again, Dad taught me how to apply a mashed up tincture of dittany and powdered silver to the ugly angry gash. It was an odd greyed-out greenish colour that he had me smear liberally onto a thick wad of bandages and fixed into place by a few strips of Spellotape.

It wasn't until a few days after that I finally saw Remy again. My scar had healed to a lurid pink, the skin shiny and taut but closed - tinged a little grey and discoloured compared to the rest of my stomach. I still couldn't get out of bed, couldn't quite sit up on my own yet and it was one morning as Mum helped prop me up in bed for the day that a timid knock sounded from the other side of the door.

Mum bit her lip at the sound, eyes carefully not moving from my shoulders. I glanced between her and the door, wondering if she was going to answer it. Deliberately, she lowered me back to rest on the pillows piled behind me so that my upright position was comfortable and then patted my head gently.

She smiled. "You can come in, darling."

The door creaked open. "Is it okay?" Remy's voice was quiet but eager, muffled behind the wood.

"Remy?" My voice petered out into the silence. Finally the door moved. His hair was messy and his skin was pale, but barring that, my twin looked much the same as he had when we had been splashing puddles. He was holding a copy of his latest favourite book - a brightly painted book on dragons - clutched to his chest, still dressed in his pyjamas.

He smiled, bright and happy. And I grinned back - we were together again. Perhaps nothing had changed. Mum moved to the chair across the room and let my brother slide onto the double bed, plenty big enough for us kids to share and then some. "You've been sleeping so long, Mum let me finish the book!"

"What!?" I squawked. I heard Mum laugh softly behind us.

He settled beneath the sheets, curling close so that we were side by side, arms pressed together and the big book shared between our laps. He sniffed haughtily, trying to hide a faintly mischievous smirk. "I'll just have to show you how, I guess."

And for a few days, I thought nothing had. Changed, that is. He still smiled at me, still held my hands, teased me and giggled at my antics. And then his head tilted, to some unseen sound, and he would tell me the soup downstairs was overboiling before Mum even told us there was soup to be had. Or we'd be tossing paper planes from the window and he'd grab mine before it left my hand, muttering about a strong breeze heading our way. We were still twins. But when I turned to hug my brother, his eyes were a burning amber in the sunlight instead and we no longer shared the same hazel-brown irises.

In the weeks that followed, Remy would attach himself to my side every time I tried to leave the bed. Whether this was for my benefit - so I could have someone to lean on; or his - so that I remained in his sights - I didn't know for sure. I appreciated it nonetheless.

There were other changes too, of course.

Our bedroom had been barred off, locked tightly, and for all my curiosity to explore and peer at things, I would never go near our old room again. Instead, I shared my parents' room with Mum, whilst Dad and Remy would share the sofa pull-out bed downstairs. I'm not sure what would have been creepier - to peer through the keyhole and see our room stained with blood and glass, the tattered curtains fluttering in the open window; or to look through and find that everything had been fixed by a simple _reparo_ and as if nothing had occurred there at all.

My parents' room was larger than ours had been, a large double bed framed by a set of oak drawers and a fancy looking lamp with pink flowers painted on the ceramic. The bed felt like it was miles wide and there were fresh sheets pressed in the cupboards perfect for making forts with. After Remy had joined me that day, he seemed to replace Mum and Dad in keeping me company.

In fact, I scarcely saw either Mum or Dad after that. We only saw Mum at meal times and before bed, and always very briefly. She was constantly in and out of the house, leafing through the books Dad would hand her or old muggle myths about lycanthropy. Dad was a scarce sight too, owling contacts and getting in touch with old friends, always moving and dashing about the place. There were fervent, desperate looks on both their faces.

They tried all manners of things in the lead up to the first full moon: spoonfuls of powdered silver and honey before bed, scalding baths full of wolfsbane that made Remy shriek with pain and Mum and Dad cry, strange blocks of white and purple wax that they burnt all throughout our new home that choked up our lungs until tears streamed. There was no cure. No sudden healing, or miracle to be found amongst the herbs and incense. People had been trying for centuries, it was impossible for a muggle woman to stumble upon it, for a poor wizard to unearth some sort of secret potion instructions.

But Remy was their little boy. They couldn't not try. Whilst I didn't know the full ramifications that came with the status of werewolf in British society, my parents did. Werewolves, spat on and cursed. Scurrying like rats in dark alleys and scrapping for coins and crumbs in their human forms. Shackled and locked up during full moons to mutilate themselves in frustration or face drifting back into their human forms in the morning covered in blood and the taste leaden on their tongues. Werewolves died viciously. Either so ravaged by their monthly changes, they aged prematurely to an early grave. Or attacked by mobs of wizardfolk, fearful and angry until they lay beaten in ditches, alone and cold. Or by their own kind, over territory, and prey, ripped apart, their humanity devoured once the moon rises.

It was something no parent could want for their child.

They were _desperate._

Nothing worked, of course.

Apart from the attempts for a cure, us children spent our time indoors, reading books and playing pretend and not speaking of the looming deadline, though I'm sure both of us thought of it often. I certainly did. The time between the night of the attack and Remy's first full moon seemed to last for aeons and yet also barely a blink. Dad was no Healer, but he had a Mastery in defence magic. It had been in studies of amortal wraiths - things like my mum's favourite boggarts, or dementors, or poltergeists - but nonetheless, he knew how to defend himself and his family.

The week of the full moon, Dad led us to the middle of the upstairs hallway, his face more relaxed and at ease than I had seen him for the past few weeks. He dropped our hands, shot us a conspiratorial look and a wink before reaching upwards. Remy and I both followed his fingers until they met a loop of black iron screwed into the ceiling that I'd never noticed before. He ushered us back a few steps and then pulled, bracing his back. The ceiling creaked and groaned above us as the hinges moved. Dad's biceps bulged and tensed, as the a square of the ceiling lifted away and finally opened like a hatch with a _whumph!_

He turned to us, beckoned with a loose curl of his fingers.

Remy and I stared.

"Has that always been there?"

Dad chuckled and flicked his wand, mumuring _"scalario!"_ before he quirked his lips back at us, "Watch your step on the way up." A rope ladder fell from the opening like a tongue from a frog's mouth and swayed before us for a moment and then Dad stepped up and up and disappeared from view.

I giggled.

We had been forbidden from leaving the house. With our parents so busy there was no one to chaperone us. Rhys' visit, one of the boys we played with regularly at the Park, had not been spoken of. Within the first week, Remy had already read through all his books (the ones that had survived anyways) and his scraps of parchment stories by Mum. By the end of the second, he was so bored he was reciting them from memory at me. And he was the indoor child.

I was going mad. For the first few days, I'd contented myself to sleeping and eating and listening to Remy as he painstakingly sounded out the words written in our storybooks to me. Then, I'd added getting back on my feet again to the list. For a while, that occupied me.

And then it didn't. I was up on my feet again and raring to go, but we weren't allowed outside. It was too cold outside, and when it wasn't raining, it was strong gales, and when it wasn't that, it was dropping temperatures. Mum and Dad were too busy to waste time indulging our games. Because they had important things to do, that had to be done before it was too late. Because they had told our neighbours that our window had shattered from the strong storm and we'd both caught horrible colds. Because we didn't know if the _monster,_ that werewolf, was still out there. Without the outdoors I was bored - I couldn't read nearly half as well as Remy could, books just didn't hold that same thrall over me that they did him. Our lessons in basic literacy and mathematics had fallen to the wayside. I quickly ran out of things to draw, to do. Stuffed toys and dolls could only sustain me so long, and, my ideas for pretend games were running dry.

Playing the Princess-mage and fighting dragons no longer felt fun - not when we had faced a _real monster_ and _lost._

Without the fresh expanse of the countryside to ramble about in, I felt stifled and cramped.

Dad revealing a hidden attic, one that was so secret we hadn't even known it was there, was the most exciting thing that had happened for weeks!

"Coming!" I reached for the first rung and then hefted my weight off the ground and unto the ladder. The rope construct swung forwards and then backwards, like a pendulum. The length that made up the rung I was stood on sagging beneath my weight.

The space was strangely shaped, unlike any room I'd been in before. The walls were slanted so that the edges of the room were close to the ground and narrow, meeting in the centre of the room at the highest point of the triangular space. Wooden beams laced across the top and the walls to support the structure.

"Are we under the roof?" Remy asked as he pulled himself off the ladder and onto solid ground.

It looked like the sort of place someone would keep great troves of treasure - or perhaps a dusty long forgotten artefact. Now that I thought about it, that made so much more sense. The cottage below would have been some sort of cover, perhaps a decoy to keep people from looking too closely. The carpet on the landing was a chaotic and not particularly pretty pattern of yellows and browns and cream flowers that made your eyes swim, the perfect decoy to keep people from looking up and finding a secret attic full of gold and jewels and ancient artefacts!

"Uh oh, she's got that look on her face again," Remy huffed, nudging me.

"What look?"

Dad ruffled our hair, and without looking I knew he was rolling his eyes. "Don't tease your sister, Remus."

I stuck my tongue out, impishly.

"And the one that says you're daydreaming again." He continued.

"Dad!" Across from me, Remy snorted a laugh.

But it wasn't anything like I'd daydreamed. Perhaps the attic had always been there, or perhaps the space had come into fruition through magic. But we hadn't needed it before and it had only come into its use now. It wasn't a treasure room. It wasn't something so wondrous at all.

"It's a precaution, for your full moon next week."

"Me…?" The horrified whisper slipped past Remy's mouth. I felt blindsided. For Remy. For the transformation. We…hadn't spoken the words out loud, not yet. It still felt too soon - it had only been a few weeks since I'd awoken! I wasn't, we weren't ready. Not for this. The wind felt like it should have been whistling through the space, cold and biting and seeping into my bones but instead it was utterly too still.

Dad crouched down, hands coming up to hold Remy's small shoulder's, shaking in his grasp. "Son," He said softly, "your mother and I haven't given up - we're still looking for a cure! We won't stop trying." The attic was for my brother - to keep him locked up. To keep him from hurting us. I wanted to close my eyes, so that I wouldn't have to look at this place, at Remy's heartbroken face, at Dad trying to be strong. I didn't want to look anymore. "We'll set up some lights in here, cast cushioning charms on the walls, it won't be so bad," Dad was saying. "And I'll be by the trap door, all night, right there. I won't move for anything."

Remy's shaking turned into gasps.

"Shh, shhh," Dad pulled him into the crook of his neck, his own eyes fluttering shut. I couldn't speak. Couldn't move. I wanted to break something, until the shards of it broke in my hands or scattered like sand in the breeze. "We love you, son, no matter what. It's going to be alright."

I wanted to reach for Remy. To kiss his freckled cheeks and tell him we were still best friends no matter what. And hold his hands so we could pull each other up. But I couldn't - I couldn't reach for him - because what if I _broke him?_

Dad carried Remy downstairs, speaking in low, gentle tones, like merely speaking aloud would hurt him. I followed behind, silent and solemn. Mum gasped when she saw them, her hand jolting to her mouth and then turned and ushered them towards the bathtub.

I didn't follow.

Instead, I turned to look back up the way I came, back into the dark attic. Without the light of Dad's wand, the ladder disappeared up into deep inky darkness, like a square of black abyss had opened in the very roof of our home. Would I see those yellow eyes again if I looked upwards next week?

Maybe not through glass this time, but in the face of my brother.

Remy spent the rest of the week in bed, eyes shut, deaf to the world. When he ate, he took nibbles and sips and pushed broth around in his bowl until it splashed over the lip. He didn't move, or read, or speak. Mum and Dad moved us both up to their old room but told me to leave him be, let him grieve, they said. I didn't understand it. Grief was for the dead. Remy was _not_ dead, not dying - and neither were we.

I tried to read him his books, like he'd read to me whilst I was bedridden. But the words were hard and I stumbled and my tongue tied, the words got choked in my throat. Usually, when I butchered his favourite stories, he would nudge me fondly, or roll his eyes with a teasing grin, snatching the book from my fingers before settling in to show me how it was done. Remus read in hushed, awed tones, and the words would cease to be words and be worlds to explore instead. Now he said nothing at all, amber eyes staring blankly at the ceiling.

It was like he couldn't hear me.

"It's going to be alright." I would try. But my voice was nowhere near as solid as Dad's, or insistent like Mum's. Mine trembled.

He didn't reply.

Mum and Dad no longer slept. They went from desperate to frantic. Dad would spend hours inside the cellar, casting spell after spell until he dropped from exhaustion. Mum would spend days at a time outside the house, to return with thick bundles of herbs and plants, for chopping and preparing for the potions and poultices Remy would _need_ once he returned to us.

I spent the seven days before the full moon by Remy's side, fumbling with the words clumsily, pressed against his side in the bed and watching his chest rise and fall.

The last night we had, before the full moon, I awoke to a rustling sound in the early hours of the morning. It was quiet, barely audible even in the still night. The bed beneath me was shaking. Slowly, I peered through my lashes. Remy was crying - I froze - the breaths were shuddering in his chest, too shallow to be helping. His fingers were clamped so tight to his face that the digits were white, although he had tremors that were making the bed shake beneath us. He was keening, low, like he was hurt.

I shuffled closer to him, until our sides were flushed together. He had been ice cold to the touch before, teeth chattering in his skull; but now, as the moon appeared nearly whole in the sky, he was burning hot.

"Remy." His eyes flickered, until at last he heard me - amber eyes met mine in the darkness. My hand reached for his, clammy and weak, our fingers lacing together. I didn't have time to be scared, of Remy, of the monster, of breaking my younger brother. If I didn't reach for him, then maybe I'd never be able to reach for him again.

I searched for what I wanted to say. His eyes, which had startled me so much before, looked intense in his face, a rich gold, amber that seemed to glow this close to a full moon. I took a breath, and when I spoke again I found my voice oddly steady.

"I'm still your twin…your's and tomorrow night's." I said. "And every night after that."

I wanted to say more. To tell him that we had been by each other's side before we'd even known we were alive, listened to the same beat of our Mum's heart. We were _twins_ , magical twins - lycanthropy couldn't touch that. I'd stand by him and protect him no matter what. I was scared still, but I was sure that I'd loved him before I had even been born and this curse wouldn't change anything. But I wasn't sure he'd be able to hear that right now, not when he was so raw and hurt.

You'll be okay, I wanted to say. "I won't leave." I said instead, because it was the only thing I could promise him right now. And I couldn't lie, not about this.

He held my gaze - for one breath, two.

And then he reached for me, arms wrapping around my ribs in a bruising grip. My shoulder was damp beneath his cheek.


	3. Leave A Light On

_**Chapter 3: Leave A Light On**_

* * *

The day of the full-moon there was a sense of surreal-ness to it all.

Mum had let us lie in, sleeping until our room was bright, even through the closed drapes. I awoke slowly and groggily, pawing away the too-warm sheets and my pyjamas sticking to my skin. A slow start to such a tense day. It felt like I should have awoken as the sun rose, or something, but by the time we stumbled down to the kitchen, lunch was already in the oven.

Remy and I sat down, shoulder to shoulder, at the table as Mum put down a plate of cheese toasties on the surface. On the far side, Dad flitted between the bookcases, reading a tome absentmindedly as he strode across the room to pick up another from the shelf.

We shared glances between the two of them, wondering just when Hope Lupin would realise what Lyall was doing.

Mum glanced up just as he was about to do it for the fourth time. Her eyebrow twitched. "How many times have I told you to sit down while you read? Before you brain yourself on the coffee table?"

"No tea, thanks." Dad mumbled, looking up for a second, only to snag another book and deposit the previous one into the slot it left behind.

Her eyebrow twitched. Again. "I wasn't asking."

"In a minute, dear."

Mum's eyes narrowed, watching him continue to mutter and pace. And then, with a wicked grin that had Remy and I reaching up to cover our ears, she turned back towards the kitchen counter and hefted the largest saucepan up into the air.

Her wooden spatula rose up… and then down with an almighty clang.

Dad tripped, sprawling across the rug, head over heels. He groaned from his place on the floor, clutching his ears with a silly pout, which slowly morphed into a very startled look as Mum strode towards him, apron and all.

"Come and have lunch, _dear._ " She drawled, the spatula still in her hand.

He scrambled to his feet, following her back to the table. "R-right, of course!"

"And," she said over her shoulder, "Sit down whilst you read."

It almost felt like a normal Saturday, slow and languid, the backdoor open to let the barely-there autumn breeze in. A rare sunny day in late November. It felt like the most normal things had been, that whole month; watching Mum prod Dad into a seat and fussing around the kitchen with a mischievous grin to herself for catching him off-guard. The cheese was rich and gooey between the slices of toast, spilling over the sides so that after every couple of bites I had to lick my fingers clean.

It felt strangely anticlimactic - like someone had pulled the plug on the vacuum whilst _naina_ was hoovering. All the frenetic energy and anxiously bustling around the house had abruptly drained dry. It was nicer for sure, our parents were smiling again and Remy was humming happily around the triangle corner of his toastie.

But strange.

I kept wanting to take second glances at everyone. Remy still had dark smudges around his eyes and his skin was so pale the blues of his veins peered back at me. Similarly, Mum and Dad still look tired and exchanged a few anxious-encouraging looks over our heads when they thought we wouldn't notice.

It was odd, but I appreciated it nonetheless - the weight of Remy's too warm shoulder on mine and Mum trying to get us all to eat some salad exasperatingly whilst Dad sent longing looks back to his books.

After lunch, Mum let us snuggle up close to her on the couch, tucked under her arms and Dad sat down on the old, squashy, armchair that Uncle Huw said was the ugliest thing he'd seen. And for the rest of the afternoon, they took turns reading to us - not to teach us how to read the words, or spell them - just for us to listen to.

The settee felt soft and golden as their words drifted around in the space. There was no fire in the hearth, but we didn't need it anyways.

Despite the calm, the niggling sense of surreal-ness hovered in the back of my head. It was nice, and the best thing that had happened that month, apart from reuniting with Remy, of course. Maybe they were trying to keep Remy occupied before tonight? Or trying to make sure he saved his energy? I could hear his slow, deep breaths from the other side of Mum so he must have been tired.

The conversation, one-sided as it was, that we'd had last night kept playing over in my head. I wondered if I should have said something else - something more , _more_ \- what that was I didn't know. In that moment, the world had felt at once too small and too large. Remy had needed me to say something and what I'd said just hadn't felt like enough. There was so much more, than just a paltry _I'll stand by you_ or _I love you_ , that I could have - should have said.

I relied on him a lot.

He was always the one I poked and prodded to back me up when the other kids disagreed with me. Or the one who would eat the mushrooms I pushed onto his plate. More than that, I relied on him to be there. No matter what, no matter when and against who, as long as he was there, that was the important part.

I didn't fall asleep, but with the lull of the tale and the soft susurrus of the faded pages, it was a close thing. The next time I glanced out the window, the sun was far lower in the sky than I remembered. Mum was carding a hand through Remy's hair, his head pillowed on her thighs as his eyelids fluttered in sleep. Dad closed the book, its spine unbending as the leather moved back into place, and for a long moment just looked at us.

Finally, he sighed and got to his feet, gesturing for me to do the same. Mum kissed my temple as she released me, nudging me forwards.

He led me out the room, past the dining table and the remains of lunch, past the stove and the hefty pan Mum used as a gong, and out into the corridor. From here, the couch and the sunlit window were out of view, hidden behind the column of the wall.

"Darling," He knelt down to look at me, square in the eyes. "I know it's been a rough couple of weeks."

I stared at my bare toes, the soft grain of wood beneath them.

"And you've been very brave - looking after your brother, you know."

I shrugged. "We're twins."

For a moment he was silent, and then, "You're a good sister, I'm so, so proud of you, Ro." He placed a hand on my shoulder. "Tonight is going to be different, and a little scary. We've spoken to Rhys' parents about having you over tonight, if you want."

I shook my head before I could even get the words out. I was terrified. Terrified of what would happen, of the fact that no one seemed to know how things would unfold tonight, that we were running in blindly, of the Yellow-eyed werewolf I still saw in the window panes at night, and that he'd come back to finish what he'd started. But I'd made a promise. To Remy - a promise I swore to keep. "I'm not leaving."

Dad gave me a long measured stare, what he was looking for in my expression I couldn't tell. His brows were furrowed and the faint stress lines that had manifested recently were obvious in the light. Finally, he let out a deep sigh, eyes shutting and pinching the bridge of his nose. "Okay," His hands were firm on my shoulders, "Okay, fine - but you have to promise me you'll stay in the bedroom until either your mum or I come and get you."

I nodded.

"Is that clear? Will you promise?"

"I promise." I whispered.

Things moved quickly after that. We piled as much soft bedding and cushions and blankets as we could into the attic upstairs, stripping the cupboards clean of fresh linen until the floor of the attic was fairly lined by plush cotton. Dad set about casting our favourite twinkle lights, scattering the luminescent floating orbs about the space, bobbing like bubbles on an air current. Mum burnt the last of the purple incense blocks, scattered a few herbs and prayed - even though we hadn't set foot in a church in years.

We ate dinner apart. Mum and Dad caught bites in between their preparations. I had mine, a thick stew of potatoes and meat, in a rush too, scalding my mouth before Mum descended on me in a flurry. She washed and dried the bowl and cutlery before I could even protest and was quickly trying to get me sequestered away pointedly. I pretended not to notice, lingering by the windows to look outside and brushing my fingertips over the ridges of the bricks in the walls.

The sun was promptly disappearing behind the distant hills, and a deep hue was settling in. I passed Remy on the stairs, his hair wet from having just left the bath and smelling of medicines and herbs. Our noses wrinkled in synchrony.

"You stink."

He stuck his tongue out. " _You_ stink _."_

His shoulder jostled mine briefly. Our fingers brushed.

"Ro! Stop dawdling!" Mum called from our parents' room, voice a little sharp. "We've not got all day!"

Our fingers linked for a moment, caught. Remy looked both better and worse than he did yesterday. Better, because he was talking and smiling, and worse, because I could feel his limbs shaking and the heaviness in his posture, like even breathing was draining. His hands were hot and clammy and his loose grip on the banister made it look like he would keel over just from sneezing.

But his golden eyes were steady when they met mine.

I gave his hand a squeeze. "Coming!" And darted up the stairs, two at a time, not lifting my head to look back until I was skidding to a stop in the only remaining bedroom we had.

Mum was waiting by the bed, her hair aglow in the setting sun that made her look like a princess from a fairy tale. She gestured towards my folded pyjamas and ushered me into the bed once I was properly dressed, her hands fussing over the wrinkles in the sheets and smoothing my brow a little.

The bed felt much too big to sleep alone in. There was so much space to either side of me that it felt like I could roll around for hours and not fall off the end.

Mum leant back, looking very much like she knew what I was thinking. She quirked an eyebrow at me and I pouted back. I didn't care what wizardfolk would call her, I was'm pretty sure my mother was magic in her own right.

"Ro," She said, wryly, "No mischief tonight, please."

"…maybe."

" _Ro_." She gave me a stern look. "Not even a little."

"Fi-ine."

She chuckled a little at my sulky face, "You'll be okay here, sleeping on your own tonight, won't you?"

"Mhmm," I nodded back. "I'm a big girl." Nearly five years old, only a few more months to go, and certainly grown up enough to sleep on my own.

"And you're sure you don't want to go to Rhys' house tonight?" She added, brow furrowing, "It's not too late to change your mind."

"Nuh-uh."

"Okay," She smiled softly, but it didn't seem as happy as her usual expression. "Mummy and Daddy have to look after Remy tonight, so you'll be alright, won't you?"

I nodded. "I'll be okay, Mummy. Remy might be scared though."

She pursed her lips, pressing cold fingertips to my cheeks, "We're all a little scared, Ro." There was a little tremor in her hands. "But your Daddy's very smart, and my babies are both so, so brave," She took a shaky breath, eyes fluttering shut. "…everything is going to be okay."

She kissed my cheek with wet lashes and left the room, shutting the door behind her. And I was alone.

I shuffled around on the bed, trying to get comfortable. The drapes had been drawn on the other side of the room, cutting off the light from the darkening sky. There was still faint glow from the ambient light outside, illuminating a strip of the floor below the window in silvery blue. How long would it take for the moon to rise properly? When would things begin? The moment the moon appeared, or at its highest point in the sky?

The evening had been a blazing red when last I'd seen it, like someone had spilt cranberry juice all across it, seeping into the very colour of the clouds and the fabric of the sky behind them.

I had been sleepy earlier - sitting downstairs under the warm gaze of my parents and the tale of Ffion crossing an ocean of shimmering stars and rippling silk - but now, I felt restless. My limbs felt almost itchy, like there was static in my veins and sparks in my toes that made me curl and uncurl them. I wriggled my fingers, willing some of it away but it stayed there beneath my skin. I wanted to jump out of bed and run around the garden, roll around in the grass. If I was sitting up, I would be furiously bouncing jittery knees up and down.

I blinked hard.

A crow called from beyond the window, piercing and harsh. Outside my door, I could hear the staccato of Dad's footsteps over the creaky boards in the hallway, the faint whisper of voices. My own breathing sounded heavy in the quiet room. I'd never slept on my own before. I had always shared a room with Remy, for as long as I could remember. It was strange not to hear my own breaths echoed back to me.

Above my head, the ceiling creaked a little, the soft thumps of small footsteps in the attic moved past my room and trailed away out of range.

There was a muffled sound from the hallway, a soft song that filtered through the door. Neither mum nor dad really sang. It was _naina_ who used to sing us lullabies and teach us our nursery rhymes, and yet, a low, halting tenor tune drifted gently in. It had a sweet melody, warm and tender, the voice husky from disuse, the words were strange and foreign, nothing like the English we spoke at home or the Welsh tongue _taid_ tried to teach us.

The noises in the attic quietened.

Remy must have been listening too.

"…Mummy. " At first, I thought I must have spoken, my hands releasing their grip on the duvet and towards my mouth. "-daddy!" But when my fingers touched my lips, they were closed. My eyes lifted to the darkened ceiling above. There was a long, drawn out groan, the small voice thick, almost like it was stuck. "- _mumm-_!" The ceiling creaked loudly, low and deep, until I realised it wasn't the sound of old floorboards but Remy keening, alone.

I bolted upright, hands fisted in my sleeves, staying as still as I could so that I could listen for it again. There was a long moment of silence, hung in the air like the house itself was holding its breath. The world outside the window was mute. The world outside my door was too.

There was a heavy crash above. A chill curled its way up my spine. The light fixture swung on its wire, teetering this way and that. Over it all, the groan increased in fever and pitch and something electric and ominous clutched at my chest, the air at once too thin to breathe and too thick to swallow.

Remy's _scream_ rang into the night. It was not short or restrained. It was a long, drawn out wail, like metal on metal and the tinge of ozone and it made me want to scream to hear it. It was thick, with tears and pain and it didn't seem to stop for breath. Almost alien in the way it sounded but unsettlingly familiar. I stumbled off the bed, one hand pressing into my ear, hitting my hip off the side table and tangling my legs in the sheets. The bone throbbed with pain and my elbows stung from scraping them on the floor, but I lunged for the door handle. I hadn't remembered hearing his screams before, but my body remembered and knew exactly what it was.

My damp palms kept slipping off the door knob, too large for my small hands to turn. I shoved at the lock, lifting my other hand away from my face to use both of them to twist. I needed out, I didn't want to be trapped here, listening to my brother. It was dark and suffocating and I wanted Mum and Dad and Remy here with me. I changed my mind. I couldn't sleep alone after all.

The shrill childish screech changed, sharper and more guttural. The door wouldn't budge in my hands. It was locked. I tried pressing against it, tugging it, straining at the wood, my knuckles white around the handle. I wanted out, for Remy to stop it, for the quiet to come back-!

The feeling of electricity swimming through the air, thick and heavy like my knees should have buckled under the weight, reached a peak. My head pounded thickly, the walls pressing too close, much too close. And then, just before it reached the point of pain, it cut abruptly.

And a howl shattered through.

Pressed against the door as I was now, I could hear it. "Remus, son?" Dad calling up to the attic, Mum's soft sobbing in the background.

Silence again. I had wished for it earlier, for the strange noises, the screaming, all of it, to stop. But now that it had, I didn't feel any more comforted than before. My heart hammered beneath my shirt, loud enough that I wondered if Remy with all his new superior senses could hear it too.

"Remus?" Mum's voice stretched into the silence.

I don't remember much else of what happened that night, only that I fell asleep to the animalistic sound of whimpering and harsh snarls and something crashing in the attic above us and that I awoke back in the too-large bed too the birds singing and a quiet home. Remy was laid out beside me, in a sleep so deep it barely looked like he was breathing. I had to watch his chest to convince myself, slowly, slowly rise and just when I thought he had stopped, it would fall again. His face was turned away from me, half hidden by the mop of his hair splayed across his forehead, but from what I could see there were new scars across his cheeks, raw and red. Carefully, I slipped out of the sheets and to the bathroom to brush my teeth.

I turned the faucet on and ran my toothbrush under the rushing water before dolloping some toothpaste on the bristles and bringing it up to my mouth. The girl that stared back at me from the mirror looked glum and awful. Her eyelids were swollen and an angry shade of irritated pink. There was sticky tear tracks down her cheeks and her elbows were a little puffy, the first layer of skin there torn. Her hair was a matted mess of tawny brown and the more I stared at the girl, the more ugly she became. I spat out the white froth into the sink and rinsed my mouth and face, drying my hands and attempting a smile instead. The girl in the mirror bared her teeth at me.

Downstairs, Mum and Dad were sound asleep on the mattress in the living room. Mum's head pressed against Dad's chest and their arms wrapped tightly around each other. They must have fallen asleep late, waiting for Remy to turn back, probably. There was still some bread left from the toasties we'd had for lunch yesterday and some milk in the fridge, so I took a slice and made a cup of tea and went to sit on the steps down to the back garden.

The morning air was surprisingly cold, despite the rising sun, sending a chill of goosebumps down my shoulders and arms, and the grass was wet beneath my dangling toes.

So, it had happened. The first full moon was over.

Our family was exhausted and gaunt and stretched much too thin. Our house was a mess. Our old room still had dark splashes of blood on the walls and the floorboards. Even from my perch outside the house, I could see the shards of broken glass littered on the grass below our old window, itself smashed wide open, the wooden frame splintered beyond compare. There was a thick branch embedded in the opening, drying leaves blocking the view of the room inside, to cover up the deep claw marks engraved, there in case our neighbours happened to glance over. Apart from the one glance I had chanced inside the room, I had not been back in there since we had been attacked.

It was enough for me that our parents had deemed the room unusable, to the point where the door to it was locked at all times. Sometimes it felt weird to play with my old toys again, knowing that they had been salvaged from the wreckage and that the last time I'd touched them had been before all this had happened.

In the weeks after that first moon, we changed as a family. Mum told all our neighbours that Remy had epilepsy and said he had fits every time he was too sore from a transformation to come out to play. She even made us promise to lie to the Howells in Powys county, telling _naina_ and _taid_ and Uncle Huw that poor Remy was epileptic so sometimes we couldn't drive up to visit.

I'm sure the Howells got increasingly concerned about us. In the space of a month not only had we told them a tree had crashed into our home so they couldn't visit us, but their grandchild had also developed fits that made him so ill that sometimes we couldn't visit them. They called often and spent long hours on the phone with us. _Naina_ would fret and sound weepy even over the phone and ask me to make sure my brother was okay and that Mum was getting enough sleep. She even asked about Dad at one point, even though it devolved from _how_ he was doing to _what_ he was doing. Mum got into loud arguments with Uncle Huw on the phone and she cried often. We became more secretive as a family, less willing to spend long hours at Rhys' home and more likely to play by ourselves in the garden.

Dad had taken a month leave from work at the Ministry after the bite. If he was any other normal worker at the Ministry it probably wouldn't have been allowed and he'd probably have lost his job. As it was, the day after the first full moon, he returned to work. He was lucky he was in such high demand and to have gotten as much time off as he had.

The feverish manner our parents had adopted prior to the full moon was directed to different efforts. Dad spent more time at work, doing overtime as much as he could stand before returning home and slumping into his mattress. Mum started writing less and staying to chat at the park more, asking if anyone needed an hand on their farms. They didn't give up on looking for ways to cure Remy, even if it had never been done before. It was just that we were never a wealthy family before and now, with all the herbs and potions and tinctures that they wanted my twin to try, money was running low. Mum had already driven us out to the nearest town to a pawn shop to sell bits and pieces - a pearl necklace she never wore, a shiny tie-pin that we'd only ever seen in their wedding pictures - and told us not to tell Dad about it. We were making do, for now.

Remy bore their fussing with good humour. He was mostly happy to submit to it, unless it was particularly painful. I teased him about the scent of medicines that now perpetually clung to his skin now and made our bed smell odd, to which he only tried to hug me and force me to take a big sniff.

For Remy's second moon, Dad apparated me to Crai village and made me stay at the Howell's pub all night. He tried to make Mum go with me but they got into such a huge fight about it that in the end he snatched only me up and we disappeared with a loud pop. I cried and threw more than one tantrum at being left there and nothing would soothe me, not even _taid_ 's hot chocolate. It was a long night for all of us. I didn't get much sleep. Some part of me was so relieved at not having to hear it again, but another part was desperate to do so, if only so I knew what was happening. Dad came to collect me after lunch the next day, eyes puffy and quieter than ever, and even my grandparents couldn't bring themselves to comment beyond a "take care" as we left. The following full moons, I never did spend in the same place as Remy again, at least not until many years later.

We stayed in that cottage through the winter months, blocking the door to our old bedroom with tea towels and cloth to reduce the cold draught. Snow in the countryside fell much thicker and lasted much longer than it did in populated areas. If we had been a muggle family, I imagine we would have worn long johns constantly and hats and scarves to bed - but we had Dad, a wizard who knew heating charms and fire spells, so our house was pleasantly warm all winter.

We had several scares in the coming months. Rhys' mum started asking a few too many questions about how the family was and if we needed any help getting the house fixed from that dreadful storm several months back. Mum had to wave her off and quickly muster up a reply about heavy snow ruining repairs or something. I didn't think it was because Dad's magic couldn't fix it that that room remained locked and that branch was left there. And how odd was it that before all this I had though he could fix everything? That last bit was a silly thought and Mum had laughed oddly when I voiced it.

"Your Dad does his best, Ro." She had sighed, and given me a hug. "We all do. That's all we can ask of anyone."

So, yes, our family was super paranoid about everyone and everything. Especially of nosy neighbours and our well-meaning relatives, who kept plying us with brochures for different hospitals and drugs and success stories about kids with fits. Mum bore it all with a strained but practiced smile and would thank them for their concern. As a house rule, she hated lying. Any time Remy or I tried to get away with anything by lying, the punishment was always far more severe than if we'd just told her the truth. And somehow she always knew when we were lying too.

I knew Mum had to lie about what Dad did, I have no idea what the Howell's thought Lyall who worked long hours and had suddenly gone from living with his in-laws to having enough money to buy a home, but I think lying about what was happening to her son was more straining on her than she would like to admit. And she was lonely. Oh, she had friends in the little community we lived in, but she rarely had time to catch up with them, busy as she was either working or researching through Dad's books. And every time she saw them, they'd inevitably bring up their children and ask after Remus and if she'd heard of that new drug. Perfectly well-meaning neighbours, but she couldn't tell them the truth.

I think talking to the Howell's was even worse. _Naina_ and _taid_ wanted us to move back to Crai village, where they could take the burden off Mum's shoulders and see their grandkids more. They worried a lot about Remy's 'condition' and how we were coping. Every time I spoke to them - because we couldn't exactly apparate to go see them when the radio was announcing our county had snow so deep someone's dog had drowned simply by leaving the house - they were constantly asking if I was happy where I was, if Remy was happy, if we would like to come and visit the big lake in Powys county again and the like. All the questions only made our parents more stressed.

It was lucky enough that we lived in an area with so much land and so little people, Dad would say back, the fresh air and the lack of pollution was doing us some good. What he didn't say was that although Crai was a small village in the countryside, it was also a _village._ There were too many people in one area, not spread out enough for him to even entertain the idea of bringing a werewolf cub there. Mum would simply sigh and say: "It's closer to London."

The biggest scare we got was not from the nosy neighbours or well-meaning Howells, but from little Rhys Jones. Remus was still recovering from the transformation several days back, as this one had left him with a dislocated shoulder from charging crossbeams in the roof all night, but Mum had forcefully bundled me out the house to go play at Rhys' without him because she had already said we were going to Rhys' mum and Hope Howell was not going to be made a liar. So begrudgingly, I spent a couple of ours wading through the already dwindling snow piles and attempting one last snow man who I made Rhys name 'Remy II' so that my brother could still participate. It was as we were trudging back to the house to ask Mrs Jones if there were any carrots left from Remy II's nose that Rhys said, "Hey, guess what I heard a few nights ago?"

I grunted, rubbing my cold fingers together. The wool of my gloves were caked in ice and snow and my fingers were certainly feeling it. He took the sound as a sign of interest.

"It was super dark, right, (ooh, night and right, that rhymes!), um, and I was supposed to be sleeping but…" He let the sentence trail off, eyes wide as pennies in his head. "I heard A WOLF!" And then he howled.

It wasn't even a good howl, or particularly scary sounding, but it still sent a chill down my spine. My mouth felt dry. "A wolf?" My mouth moved mechanically, "I'm pretty sure they only exist in zoos now, stuuupid."

For a moment, Rhys' jaw moved soundlessly and I thought he would press further. After a moment, instead, he slumped a little. "Awww," He kicked up a few clumps of ice and snow and we watched it scatter into powder a few steps away. "A wolf would have been so cool though!"

I rolled my eyes outwardly, heart pounding. "I don't think we get wild wolves anymore, not here at least."

When I went home that afternoon, I went straight to my parents and told them immediately. The colour drained from Dad's face, much like I thought mine must have earlier, and I hoped that the cold covered how pale Rhys' careless remarks had made me feel. It was lucky it was only Rhys that seemed to think he heard anything, because if it was anyone else I think shotguns would have been taken off the wall. We lived in a community of farmers after all, whose very livelihoods were their livestock and crop, and they had no qualms when it came to protecting their animals. Dad started putting up silencing spells on the attic after that, even though putting it on such a large space on top of all the other spells he needed to secure the space was fairly draining. When I asked why he didn't just make them permanent, Dad had shrugged and said it took a lot of work to make sure it even lasted the whole night.

There were other scares too, but nothing quite as effective as Rhys' cry of wolf.

Eventually, the winter thawed and spring began showing its face in the fresh shoots coming through and the longer days. Remy and I turned five, at last! We didn't have much of a party but there was cake and singing and Uncle Huw drove up for the first time since spring had come with our grandparents in tow. Rhys was there pointing out that cake and _taid_ rhymed, which made Remy turn nearly blue with frustration and we both rubbed it in our friend's face that he was no longer the oldest. We ate cake until we felt sick and danced around the garden, playing tag until we were sweating, as was our right as birthday prince and princess.

 _Naina_ had knitted us new blankets for our birthday, matching cream wool that was marshmallow soft and had an 'R' stitched into the corner in pink for me and blue for Remy. _Taid_ gave us a new set of boats to play with in the bath, a fleet of brightly coloured canoe boats to add to our collection that made Mum shake her head at the amount of bath toys we now owned. Uncle Huw gave us a bar of fancy chocolate as long and as thick as his arm each - Remy started drooling almost immediately, the chocoholic.

They stayed long enough to eat lunch, hand out gifts and spend a few hours with us before they had to leave again to drive off home. It took a couple of hours to drive back to Crai village after all, and we didn't have enough room to sleep three extra people. Rhys and his family didn't stay for much longer after they left, all three of us kids coming down from our sugar high with a crash, but all in all, Remy and I both agreed in bed that night, that it had been the best day ever.

That March, not long after we turned five, Remy nearly smashed through the bolted trap door of the attic.

* * *

 **A/** **N** : So two chapters uploaded today as I'll be taking a months hiatus for exams and these have been sitting in my dock for a while :) see you when I'm back - title from 'leave a light on' by Tom Walker


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